


write it on the skyline

by thisissirius



Category: Social Network (2010)
Genre: M/M, Weird writing Style
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-29
Updated: 2011-12-29
Packaged: 2017-10-28 09:21:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/306367
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisissirius/pseuds/thisissirius
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chris bullies Mark away from the computer, fights him with words and angry gestures, tells him to get the fuck away from this stuff, I mean it like it’s detrimental to Mark’s health to be trying to find his best friend. [READ AUTHORS NOTES]</p>
            </blockquote>





	write it on the skyline

**Author's Note:**

> WARNINGS:there are WARNINGS AT THE END if you don't want to be spoiled. PLEASE READ THEM if this doesn't bother you.
> 
> this is the first time i've written anything like this and i dont even know what made me want to do it. i spent the whole time wondering how ooc mark actually was so... i hope he's not? enjoy anyway?
> 
> disclaimer; i am writing about mark zuckerberg and eduardo saverin (and other characters) as presented in the movie the social network. this is no way about the real people. also; i do not own the social network. this is for love and not profit.

The canteen is full of people.

Mark doesn’t usually notice because he doesn’t use the canteen. He prefers his assistant to bring his lunch into his office and let him eat there but Chris had been adamant today that he eat with them. He guesses it has something to do with the date (three years to the day that Eduardo walked into his office and _lawyer up, asshole_ ) and Mark acquiesced because it was easier than fighting. Chris was dangerous on dates like this, on _occasions_ even if those occasions weren’t necessarily good ones.

The mounted TV is on low but it takes up a huge portion of the wall Mark’s facing so he can’t help but catch the images rolling across the screen. He flicks his gaze back to his plate and picks at his food. He’s really not hungry and he figures it’s because he’s still thinking about the code he could be implementing, the bugs that need fixing.

“Mark,” Chris sighs and opens his mouth to say something else but Mark raises his head to look and stops, frozen in his seat.

Staring at the screen behind Dustin’s shoulder, Mark’s eyes are drawn to the wreckage of an aircraft, burning debris on the crest of a wave and then endless ocean. _Plane crash_. That’s not what draws his attention, though. It’s the scrolling words on the screen. Like _left New York at 2:30 this afternoon_. Like _not sure what happened, but_. Like _passenger list has been confirmed_.

And _no survivors_.

He knows who was on that plane of _no survivors_ because he remembers Dustin talking about it, even if he didn’t think _no survivors_ at the time that it would be relevant because they haven’t spoken _no survivors_ and he knows, he knows, he knows

 _Eduardo Saverin, Facebook Co-Founder, dead_

was on that plane and his fingers are digging so hard into the edge of the table and there’s a roaring in his ears and he can’t think, can’t focus, can’t catch any strains of code because

 _Eduardo Saverin, Facebook Co-Founder, best friend, best friend, is dead_.

 

&&&

 

Mark doesn’t really understand what happens next.

He registers the information of the plane crash alongside a litany of _nononono_ that hums under his skin like a constant. He finds it comforting and he decides something he is going to hold onto for a long time: Eduardo is not dead.

Mark’s never been very aware of what people think about him because he just doesn’t care. He knows he’s probably going to upset Chris and Dustin but it registers on the same level that the necessity of eating and sleeping register. With his single-minded focus, not very high at all. He realises he’s still clutching the edge of the table but the roaring in his ears has become a cacophony of sound that indicates the voices of his staff. He ignores it all because it is not important.

“Mark?” Dustin is standing next to him, one hand on his shoulder. He’s concerned, Mark notes, but ignores it. He can’t stay here when he needs to know what happened to Wardo and where he is and how to get to him, save him and

Chris is blocking his way.

Mark stares at him. His palms itch and he’s never hit Chris before, never _wanted_ to but it’s something he’s having to fight off because _Wardo needs him_.

“ _Don’t_ ,” Chris pleads, head turning so that he can see the TV.

The news anchor is solemn, sad with a touch of fake sympathy that Mark knows to look for. He doesn’t care. This is the anchor’s job, he has to do this but he has no ties to the people on that plane. Mark supposes he might have felt the same had Eduardo not been - been there, been there and he’s going to go and find him because it’s all he has left.

A world without Wardo is like a world without and Mark doesn’t know how to exist where Wardo isn’t around. Even with Wardo hating him, Mark had the option of texting, emailing, phoning, doing something other than the endless nothing that death will leave him with and he is _not_ without Wardo

where mark is a constant, eduardo is a constant and eduardo is his best friend and even if this is false, he is still eduardo and mark is still mark and there is no room for ERROR: FALSE STRING//ERROR: NO STRING FOUND AT ALL

which doesn’t even make sense as _code_ but everything is tangled in Mark’s head.

There’s too much in this room and not enough because he needs his computer, he needs to find out where the plane crashed and he needs the survivor list and Wardo’s seat number and he needs to not be standing here, looking at a news anchor who _doesn’t care_ that Wardo’s out there somewhere, alone and maybe hurt.

“Mark, for fucks sake!”

Chris has his hands on Mark’s shoulders and he looks frightened but Mark just shakes his head.

“I need, I need, I need to find him, Chris. I need to get out of here and,”

he shoulders his way past Chris and doesn’t stop until he’s in his office.

Chris and Dustin follow him like he knew they would but he doesn’t care about them. He’s already typing furiously, determined to find out everything he can about this crash before they lock it down due to investigation or whatever they do after a plane crashes and Mark wonders if anyone has told Mr. Saverin that his son is missing, missing, _gone_ and he wonders if he should do it himself. Not that he thinks that would be a good idea; maybe Wardo would be mad at him.

Chris is standing in front of him now. His eyes are sad but Mark pretends that he doesn’t see that. “Please, Mark. Let’s just call-”

“If you’re not going to help me then get the fuck out of my office.”

Chris just waits like he knows something that Mark doesn’t which is ridiculous because

Mark’s face crumples. “I just want to find him.”

There’s silence and then, “He’s gone, Mark.”

His chest feels tight and he hears something nasty and scathing come out of his mouth but he doesn’t know what he’s said. Chris is leaving, though and Mark feels satisfied with a touch of regret. It doesn’t matter.

Eduardo matters.

 

&&&

 

He downloads everything;

Videos of the crash.  
The route the plane was supposed to take.  
Pictures of the rescue (which wasn’t really a rescue.)  
News reports ( _no bodies, unsure yet if there are any survivors but the outcome looks bleak_.)  
The seating plan of the plane.

Mark is a genius; he can work out where Eduardo was sitting, where he would have been if, if, because the plane crashed and find out how he survived and lived and because he’s not dead, Mark will find him.

The pictures are disturbing but Mark looks at them anyway. It’s illegal to even have them on his hard drive, possibly, but he needs to look, to see, to know what could have happened to Wardo if he’d not survived. There is next to nothing left of anybody on the plane. He accidentally tears one of the photos when he sees a face, distorted by the sea but a face and it turns into Eduardo before he can stop it and he’s tearing, ripping the photo until he can’t see Wardo in the water.

(It’s not even a person, there’s nothing in the photo but debris and fire but Mark doesn’t linger on why he’s seeing faces, why he can’t stop thinking about Wardo.)

Mark opens his laptop and starts to work.

 

&&&

 

“Mark,” Wardo says and Mark smiles.

 

&&&

 

 _”The list of the dead is extensive but we can confirm that billionaire Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin was listed amongst passengers on the flight list. It is unclear whether he actually boarded.”_

 _”- Eduardo Saverin was listed amongst the passengers on the flight list. It is unclear whether he actually boarded.”_

 _“It is unclear whether he actually boarded.”_

 _“- whether -”_

“If you play that one more time, I will punch you in the face.”

Mark shuts his laptop and ignores Dustin’s expression, Chris’s glare and addresses the shareholders, palms itching to open the laptop again. Chris grinds his teeth and presses a hand to his eyes, Dustin’s hand on his arm and Mark studies them. He thinks they are breaking but he doesn’t know why;

they’ve convinced themselves Eduardo is dead. Maybe they miss him like Mark would, if, if, if. But he isn’t. So.

 

&&&

 

“I don’t understand them.”

Wardo smiles and stretches out on the sofa. Mark can see skin and his mouth quirks up into a smile. “They miss me, Mark. You’re doing fine. It’s okay.”

Mark shrugs. “Of course it is. I know it is. I was just.”

Just, Wardo is gone again and Mark frowns. This is stupid. _Why can’t he figure this out?_

 

&&&

 

Dustin doesn’t come by anymore. Mark thinks he’s making him sad, angry and hateful all at once but all of it is _for_ Mark rather than directed at him. Mark’s never seen him without a smile on his face but every time he comes into Mark’s office with food, papers, _anything_ , there’s always a slight downturn to his mouth and he makes as if to say something but always thinks better of it.

Holding onto the delusion of Eduardo’s death is hard, Mark thinks.

Eventually, Dustin stops coming in. He stays close to Mark, though. Takes the desk right outside his office like he can hold sentry without even talking to Mark or acknowledging him in any way. It’s stupid to think that Mark’s going to have a mental breakdown about this because he _knows_ Eduardo is alive. How could he think different?

Chris is the other end of the scale. He bullies Mark away from the computer, fights him with words and angry gestures, tells him to _get the fuck away from this stuff, I mean it_ like it’s detrimental to Mark’s health to be trying to find his best friend.

“You have to stop this.”

“Wardo says I can find him.” Mark ignores the expression on Chris's face.

“How long have you been talking to Wardo, Mark?”

“He comes and goes,” Mark says, distracted. He’s watching the video of the crash, rewinding, watching the video of the crash, rewinding and Chris makes a noise in the back of his throat, winces at the sound of plane hitting water and leaves the room.

Mark wonders how long it’s going to be before Chris stops coming in, too.

 

&&&

 

“I’m starting to believe them.”

Wardo makes a face but doesn’t say anything in return. Mark thinks he’s been staring at the images so long that the one of the ocean fire is going to be burnt onto the back of his eyelids. He’ll see it in his sleep, when he bothers to do that. He can’t let himself lie down, close his eyes because he can’t rest if there’s a chance Wardo’s out there and his palms are itching again. He’s been awake for thirty, thirty two, thirty four hours and it’s a day he’s going to drag out because if it ends, if it slides into Thursday, Friday, Saturday then Mark might lose Wardo.

The room is too close all of a sudden and Mark can’t breathe, can’t get air in his chest and he feels like clawing at his hoodie, his shirt and everything between his chest and the air and his hands are shaking and the doors flying open but Mark feels tight, itching to get out of his skin and there’s something he can’t remember, something

“Breathe, Mark, please,” Dustin says, a hand on his back and Chris is there and they’re both talking in low tones and Mark clutches at their arms, fights for breath and finally finds it, nothing they’re saying makes sense but the panic resides until he’s sucking in air like it’s going to disappear again.

“Steady, Mark,” Chris says and Dustin’s stroking his back, eyes downcast.

If he tilts his head _just so_ he can pretend one of them, either of them, someone is Wardo except they aren’t at all.

Dustin stops his hand and finally meets Mark’s eyes. It’s the first time he’s done so in minutes, hours, days. “Mark, please.”

Mark stares down at his hands, at the laptop, anywhere but at them.

 

&&&

 

Mark isn’t surprised when Wardo stops showing up. Everyone leaves him. Except Wardo was never supposed to because that means, that the plane, that somewhere he’s,

and he’s left alone.

 

&&&

 

Mark cuts up the pictures of the plane and the debris and the fire, fire, fire and spreads the pieces around the floor. _Obsession will be your downfall_ , someone once said and Mark wants to laugh, (cry, cry, cry) and he thinks he can build Wardo from the pieces scattered around, bring him back, make him perfect. Perfect like Facebook, made from the failure of FaceMash and Mark’s jealousy and anger.

He’s only half way through when Chris comes in and pulls his hands away, guides him to the couch and presses him down onto it. Mark can still see the puzzle, the pieces and Wardo’s face mapped out by fire, death and destruction. He tries to look at it a different way, if it changes the bad into good but there’s always something about Mark’s creations that means he’s missing something, _someone_ and he says,

“Chris,”

like Chris can make it better.

“This single minded focus is going to kill you,” Chris says, brushing a curl out of Mark’s eye and it’s a move so painfully Wardo that Mark’s chest hurts. “I wish this was out of character.”

Mark doesn’t know what he means.

 

&&&

 

Mark can’t sleep;

He stares at the seating plan. Stares at the trajectory of the plane, watches the videos of the impact and the bodies, the debris, the fire. His fingers twitch and there's something solid and angry sitting in his chest and he wants to, he can't, he needs,

He shoves his laptop across the table and watches it fall to the floor, shattering with a satisfying crash. He doesn't know what happens after that but there's a lot of shouting and broken things around his office and Chris and Dustin and he wants to tell whoever is shouting to shut up, he can’t think, he can’t concentrate and then someone's crying and he doesn't think it's him because he's never cried, doesn't remember crying, doesn’t _know how_ to cry,

His eyes hurt and his heart hurts and he tries to remember Wardo's face, his smile, his _person_ but it feels like it's slipping away and he doesn't want it to. How will he, how can he, he won't remember and Wardo will disappear forever and Mark can't stand that.

"Mark," Chris whispers and Mark buries his face in Chris' neck because he knows that's what people are supposed to do. There aren't tears anymore but he lets Chris hold him even though there isn't anything to hold.

Mark feels disconnected; a false string, a finite loop.

Erased code.

 

&&&

 

“Mr Saverin?”

Mark rests his fingers on the keys of his keyboard, light and barely there. He wonders if he could code, if it would work or if his brain would stutter and die like, like, but he can’t think that way because he needs to focus on the angle of Dustin’s chair, the way his leg is jiggling up and down against the wood, the line of the floor right to Chris’ shoe.

Chris is perfectly still; phone wrapped tight in his hand.

“No sir, this isn’t a joke.” Chris is frowning and Mark doesn’t like what it does to his face, tense and hurt. He likes to remember Harvard, the way Chris would smile and the pull against his eyes, making them crinkle. He remember Dustin looking the same, always talking about a girl or alcohol or how many more times he and Eduardo could do _this_ or _that_ before Mark had finished coding.

He’d never finished; they’d always won.

Eduardo smiles like Chris is smiling. Eduardo _smiled_ and that’s what’s going to hurt;

having to remember that everything has a _d_ on the end like one letter can change the way a person exists (existed) like all they’re worth is the tense that they’re thought in. Wardo deserves better than that.

“Are you sure?”

There’s something about the pitch to Chris’ voice and he’s waving Dustin forward and Mark wonders why there’s a smile on his face when he’s talking to Wardo’s _father_ and he still doesn’t know why he wasn’t allowed because Wardo’s father has met him, eyes hard and angry but they knew, cared about, loves his son.

(Loves because even now Mark doesn’t know how to separate that part of himself; he still loves Wardo and he always has, it was the problem, the reason, cutting Eduardo out of the company was like cutting out part of his heart but it was a necessary evil, a certainty, a fixed point in the code and Eduardo can’t, isn’t, wasn’t, Mark doesn’t even know what tense.)

Wardo wasn’t supposed to stay angry, keep away or anything - he was never supposed to _die_ before Mark could say, beg, want.

“He’s alive!” Chris says, the instant he shuts his phone.

Mark just stares.

“Mark! Mark this is brilliant. Wardo’s alive, we were wrong.”

“No,” Mark says, fingers digging into the edge to the table. He keeps his voice level and he doesn’t know how because he wants it to rise, he wants to punch Chris in the face, he wants to shake them all until they _realise_. “You don’t get to do this.”

“Mark-”

“You just _told me_.”

Chris shakes his head and Mark follows it, the way Chris’ jaw clenches when he speaks to Mark, the way his hands clench into fists. “I was _wrong_.”

Not the first time, Mark thinks and then wonders if Wardo would think that was fair. “I broke my other laptop.”

Dustin tilts his head. “We can get you-”

“It’s broken. I’ve lost my code. I can’t remember the code because I was thinking about Wardo.” He waits for the silence to drag on and then presses his laptop shut. He stares at the lid, at the code hidden in its depths. “I have 36 drafts in my email.”

They’re both frowning now.

“The chances of being killed on an airline flight are 1 in 9.2 million. Wardo’s that one person and I have 36 drafts in my email.”

“Saying what?” Chris asks.

“Sorry. Variations thereof. Even if I didn't mean it.”

“You can send them,” Dustin presses, edging closer. Mark just stares. “He’s not dead, Mark. He’s okay. He wasn’t on the flight.”

“Get out.”

“Mark-”

“-we can-”

“Get out.”

They leave and Mark wonders why his hands won’t stop shaking.

 

&&&

 

He starts to code again;

It comes to him slowly, in fits and starts and bouts of hard typing and then long stretches of silence. He channels everything into both; what he feels and thinks and wants, until he doesn’t know if he can ever stop making Facebook an amalgamation of bitterness, anger and hatred at whoever decided Wardo deserved to die.

(Mark doesn’t believe in anything except what he knows and he knows it wasn’t Wardo’s time)

Facebook will be brilliant, he thinks. If he can’t have, can’t see, can’t want, then Facebook will be everything, will be all, will be. Again. Just like before except this time he doesn’t have anyone to take the company away from except himself and he thinks if he looks at Chris and Dustin long enough, they’ll take it all away from him.

He’s not crazy, not angry, not lost. He’s just lonely and empty and the endless days, months, years seem so much longer _without_.

It’s not as though he’s ever been interested in what other people are thinking, wanting, doing. He’s not a bad person (he said that to someone once, she had a nice smile, nice hands, good brain), he just wants and he knows to get from a to b but beyond that it’s just, what is, is. What happens is what Mark wants to happen; there’s no margin for error except

; wardo’s an error, wardo’s a line of code that doesn’t fit, doesn’t work. wardo’s everything and nothing and all in between. mark’s lived without him, can live without him but that was before, before when he could still call wardo if he wanted, still showed up on alerts and email and at parties, sometimes, even if mark wasn’t looking and, and, and ;

He codes Wardo’s page. It’s permanent now because he doesn’t want, can’t have, so that nobody can delete it. He saves every picture from the site onto his own private server and pretends he doesn’t rotate them on his desktop so that he’s forced to remember, to see, to feel everything he’s told himself to ignore. Coding comes easier after that; ignoring the bleep of messages from staff and Dustin and Chris and refusing to acknowledge his assistant when she walks into the room.

He doesn’t care what they want from him, he doesn’t care about anything but coding and the curl of his fingers around the can of red bull or the steady tap of his own keyboard as he types. He hasn’t been in this space for so long and he sinks into it with comfort and acceptance; this is all he has now. That thought hurts like none before but he shoves it down, buries it under layers and layers of disinterest and disregard like he always has and codes.

The screen will blur and he will ignore it.

His phone will ring and he will ignore it.

Chris touches his shoulder, his neck, the back of his head and finally, finally, Mark looks up from the screen.

“You told me he was dead, that I should, and I did. I did.”

Chris doesn’t say anything, just keeps touching him and Mark doesn’t understand what he wants, what he should do because he was coding and he hates when people snap him out of it because it takes longer than he likes to admit to get stable in real life again, to know what people want from him and to ignore it.

“There’s something you need to see.”

Mark blinks. “What?”

“I need you to come with me, Mark. Please.”

“I have to, the coding and Facebook, I can’t.”

Mark looks back at his laptop and moves his hands to type but Chris grabs them, pulls him back around until he can look him in the eye. Mark just stares at him.

“You’re coming.”

He can argue, he supposes, and threaten to fire Chris but Chris never takes him seriously and usually it’s okay, it’s fine, it’s okay because he needs Chris around when he does things by nature and it goes wrong. He makes people think he’s an asshole, a bastard but only by their standards because he’s just being honest, being true, telling people what they need to hear instead of what they should.

People should understand like Wardo did, Wardo used to like it until it was him, the focus, the centre point, the victim. Mark snorts because he’s never been a victim, not really. Wardo was stronger than he gave himself credit for, stood tall even when Mark, when his father, when everyone. Stood tall and proud and brilliant and Mark thinks he should have told him that when he was alive; should have said that Wardo was good, brilliant, best and friend, best friend, the best friend that Mark has ever had, will have.

“Mark?”

“Yes,” Mark snaps, shutting his laptop and standing. “Where are we going?”

Chris just makes a face at him and puts a hand on the small of Mark’s back. Mark flinches and pulls away; that’s how Wardo used to get Mark to follow, to come, to walk and he doesn’t want Chris to-

“Sorry.” Chris keeps his voice low but his hand is gone and Mark can breathe.

Mark walks around the desks and ignores the eyes of everyone who looks. He can’t remember how long it’s been since the canteen and the video and _Wardo_ but he knows they’re worried, care, whatever, but Mark doesn’t, isn’t and just nods at Dustin as he pulls open the door and leads them through it.

 

&&&

 

The car ride is boring. Mark wants to be back at the office doing something productive with his time but he’s trapped in the back seat with Dustin and he can see Chris glancing at him through the rear view mirror and Mark’s just tired; tired of being treated like he’s going to snap or cry or have a melt down at any second. He’s fine, he’s okay, he’s stable and he’s going to be okay. He has to be because he doesn't really have a choice and,

His iPhone vibrates against his leg and he picks it up. It’s a good distraction from wherever Chris thinks he needs to go and Mark is suddenly hit with a weird feeling and he scrolls through his email, tilting his head against the glass of the window. “I don’t want to see him.”

Dustin makes a noise beside him but Chris speaks over it. “See who?”

“If you’re taking me to see what’s left of Wardo.”

Chris has that pinched look to his face; frustration, Mark thinks and he ignores it.

“I don’t want to see him.”

“I know, Mark. There were no survivors, no bodies.”

Mark looks up, catches Chris looking at him again and just stares. There’s nothing to see in a dead body, nothing to remember except the way they look then and not before. He doesn’t think he can stand to see the lifeless form of what was once Wardo. The lack of expression, of life, the curve of his lips - even if he was angry and not smiling, laughing, soft eyes and mouth. Mark’s fingers tighten around the phone and he looks down, away, anywhere but at Chris and his accusing stare.

He doesn’t know what they expect from him, want from him, what he’s supposed to do.

He just wants to code and make Facebook better and live, live, live, pretending he doesn’t miss Wardo as much as he does.

 

&&&

 

“The airport. Why are we at the airport?”

Mark gets out of the car but he doesn’t move away. He doesn’t want to go inside. This is what happens in movies with a plane crash and people dying and officials and journalists and they’ll want to talk, to bring it up and Mark can’t do that.

“I’m not doing any-”

“It’s not publicity, Mark,” Chris snaps and grabs Mark’s arm, like he’s afraid Mark’s going to bolt.

That would be stupid; Chris would never give him the keys and he’s not _walking_ back to the office. He eyes the building suspiciously but Dustin’s on his other side so it’s not like he has any opportunity to get away. Mark supposes they’re doing this for what they think is his own good but they can’t know what he’s buried, what he’s never said, even if he thinks that they have to know it. They were all room mates _before_ and Mark made no effort to hide it, to keep it from them, to shove it down but he’s not easy to read or so they say and he’s never spoken about it out loud. Never put a name to it and made it into something it’s not; he doesn’t want it to be real because now it will be unrequited, forever and always and he can’t live like that.

Everything has an end but this, he doesn’t see how this can with one half _gone_ and he,

he’s walking through the door of the airport and he pulls his arm away from Chris because he’s here now, he’s inside. He has his hands in his pockets, fingers clenched firmly around his phone like a safety line, something to grab on to, to ground, to make sense of. He wants it to vibrate; a get out clause. Something.

“I don’t see why I have to be here.”

It’s Dustin who speaks this time, an edge to his voice that makes Mark stare at him. “We’re not forcing you to be here, Mark.”

Mark doesn’t have anyone else; Dustin and Chris want him here, _want him_ and nobody else cares enough. He follows them through the airport and he knows they’re heading to arrivals but he doesn’t know why. He pulls his phone from his pocket and gives it a glance; registers the smiling face of Wardo and feels something tight, angry and cold in his chest and when he looks up;

Mark almost drops the phone.

He doesn’t because he is not that far out of his mind, out of his person, out of _character_. On impulse, he steps back, sliding his hands back into his pockets because he doesn’t know what to do, doesn’t know what to think, can’t, doesn’t want to, _what the fuck_.

“You said you wouldn’t bring him.”

“This is for him, Wardo.”

Mark flinches, turns his face away because Wardo, dead best friend Wardo, _lost_ Wardo is standing in front of him but he’s not real because Mark had Wardo at Facebook but he disappeared but this one looks like his Wardo, all sad and angry and bitter, bitter like Mark only Mark doesn’t show it because it won’t matter, won’t make a difference.

“Mark?”

He fingers his iPhone and he hasn’t checked his email or his messages or his, his, his

“Mark.”

He sees feet, the bottom of suit pants and Mark feels that panic rise in his chest again because he’s dreaming this, he’s back on the couch and he’s lying down and he wants to wake up, to code, to forget that this is happening because he can’t deal and he needs to get out but he’s trapped, between Chris and Dustin and this person who isn’t Wardo because Wardo is dead and he crashed and he’s in the ocean, the fire, the debris and Mark’s never going to see him again.

There’s a flicker of something on that painfully familiar face and he’s turning to Chris. Chris explains but Mark tunes him out; he doesn’t care. He tries to remember what Chris and Dustin and Wardo used to joke about in dorms; ways to wake him up. Pinching, he remembers. Water on the face. _Bathroom_. He needs a bathroom. Mark turns on his heel and sees a sign for the toilets. He makes a break for it, crossing the distance in half the time because he’s sick now, stomach clenching painfully with the knowledge that his subconscious is a bastard just like people think it is and it’s like Harvard with drinking and bending over the toilet and he can hear them after him but he’s already pushed his way into the stall, bending at the waist and throwing up the nothing he’s been eating.

There’s a scuffle behind him and a hand on his forehead and it’s familiar, _trusted_ but Mark can’t be trusted, can’t trust himself. He tries to twist away but there’s another hand on the back of his neck and he just wants to melt into it because he remembers, he wants, he remembers and then,

“Oh, _Mark_ ,”

and it’s Wardo and Wardo and _Wardo_ and Mark blinks, turns his face to see the line of a familiar tanned jaw and says

“I need water on my face. I’ll wake up. You’ll still be gone.”

“I missed the flight, Mark. I overslept.”

“Eduardo never overslept unless,” Mark says, trailing off and resenting the hands touching him, drawing him into the lie and he tries to focus on code, how it feels to type and sink into the algorithm and his hands are shaking. “You won’t go away.”

A shadow and Mark ignores it.

“I knew you were still alive but they told me you weren’t. I had pictures, I had,”

“Mark,”

“I can’t,” Mark says. “I have 36 drafts in my email that I never sent to Wardo. He probably wouldn’t have read them. The odds of dying in a plane crash are,”

“-1 in 9.2 million, I know.”

Mark smiles wryly. “Now I know you’re not real.”

“Because I know the statistics of plane crashes?” Wardo makes a face. “You know me better than that,”

and that hurts, that his subconscious would say that when he doesn’t know if it’s true.

“Wardo would never,”

“Stop referring to me in the third person, Mark. I’m right here.” The fingers on his neck stroke a little. “I promise. I’m me.”

Silence. Mark can’t think and then,

“I didn’t think you’d care this much.”

“Fuck you,” Mark says, wrenching himself away from the hands and forcing himself to stand, to hug the side of the stall because it’s still gross in the bathroom but he wants, needs to get away. “You don’t know anything.”

Wardo stands because _now_ it’s Wardo, now that there’s anger back on his face. He thinks this is a better manifestation; more real.

He can’t speak because Mark won’t let him;

“I built you out of photos.”

A frown. “Mark, you’re not making sense.”

Mark doesn’t say anything else. He turns to the sinks, to wash his face because he’s gross and disgusting and he just needs to wake up, to stop this stupid dream, to get away. Chris is standing in the doorway and he says something like,

“He’s been like this, Wardo. We’re worried there’s something wrong,”

and Mark snorts, running the cold tap. There’s nothing wrong with him. There won’t be if he can just wake up. He needs to fucking code, to work on something that doesn’t remind him of Wardo but what does he have like that, everything is tainted with his friendship. Not tainted though because it implies unwanted, unnecessary, _dirty_ and nothing with Wardo was ever anything like that.

Wardo was,

“There was a photo of the crash. I saw your face but it wasn’t you because you were already dead.”

“I’m not fucking dead, Mark. I’m right here!”

“You’re dead,” Mark says, waiting for his voice to break but it doesn’t. He shrugs with one arm, shuts off the tap and watches the water swirl down the drain. “I watched the video of the plane crashing three hundred and forty eight times. I know exactly where you were sitting when it went down. I researched. I know how you would have died.”

Mark doesn’t want to look up but he meets Wardo’s eyes through the mirror. There’s an unreadable expression on his face but that doesn’t mean anything to Mark; he usually gets it wrong. “Why did you watch it that many times?”

“I don’t know,” Mark says.

“Logic tells you I must be here.”

“Logic is tragically flawed; it told me you were here before, at Facebook.”

“He was hallucinating me?” This to Chris and Chris nods, face tight.

Mark wants to laugh because this is all such a stupid waste of his time. There’s so much _else_ he could be doing.

“Why me, Mark?”

Mark’s distracted, staring at the tiles on the floor, at the scuffed marks and the dirt and thinking _this looks real_ because he thinks it’s sinking in now. Water didn’t work, pinching doesn’t work and Dustin is never this melancholy in dreams, not even the ones about death and Mark stares at himself in the mirror; is there a way to tell if you’re dreaming?

“This is real,” he says, sliding his hands in his hoodie pockets and desperately trying to remember where they parked the car. He thinks he could probably get the keys and drive himself to the office.

Wardo snorts this time and that’s, that’s so familiar that Mark looks up, searches Wardo’s face because that means, Wardo is, he’s here and he’s, his face shifts and suddenly it’s an expression Mark does know and can remember; realisation.

“I’m not dead,” Wardo says, soft. “I’m here, Mark.”

He doesn’t know what Wardo can see on his face because in seconds he’s crossed the room, one hand on the back of Mark's head, fingers sliding into his hair and the other is on Mark’s arm and he’s pulling him close and Mark thinks there’s something wrong because he’s shaking and he shouldn’t be shaking because he’s alive, he’s okay, he’s,

“You’re shaking,” Wardo whispers and holds him. “It’s you.”

Mark just presses his face to Wardo’s neck and breathes; _he’s real_. He’s real, he’s okay, he’s real. Like a mantra. A promise.

 

&&&

 

The ride back from the airport takes less time than Mark’s expecting.

He sits pressed up against the window but Wardo still manages to sit alongside him, bodies pressed together as much as possible and it’s irritating but Mark knows why he’s doing it, knows that he’s trying to let Mark see that he here’s, alive and okay. It’s, it doesn’t feel bad, it’s okay and Mark thinks there are worse ways to spend the drive because he’s lived it already, six hours with Dustin not saying a word, Chris staring at him and remembering over and over that Wardo was dead, not coming back, gone.

Except,

Except he’s here and Mark’s here and it’s okay. Not really okay but good. He thinks that Wardo is still angry at him somewhere because Wardo never knows when to let go, when to let it be and he doesn’t look like he’s changed. Mark’s not oblivious to his feelings, he just never, didn’t want to,

“Wardo,” he says, staring down at his own hands, clenched tightly around his knees. “We need to talk.”

Dustin and Chris are pretending not to listen in but Mark doesn’t care.

Wardo shifts, sliding his arm across the back of the seat and Mark wonders what he thinks he’s doing when Wardo’s fingers slide into his hair, massaging at the base of his neck and he hisses a little but not in discomfort. “Later, Mark.”

Mark opens his mouth to say something scathing, probably, or to ask why Wardo’s doing this, being here, making Mark more confused and angry and hurt but the soothing motions against his scalp are making his fingers twitch and his eyes feel heavy and he remembers this, Harvard and ulterior motives, Wardo touching him, leading him, lying him down and making him sleep, forget, _stop_.

“It’s okay, Mark,” Wardo says, dragging his name out, making it last and Mark thinks he will never tire of hearing him say it, aloud and alive and real. “Later.”

Nodding, Mark’s angry and frustrated when his head slides down to land on Wardo’s shoulder but he doesn’t say anything; just lets the soothing motions lull his eyes closed and he can be angry later, tell Wardo that it’s not fair that he uses this against him, makes him do things Chris can’t make him do and it’s not fair, it’s not fair, it’s not

 

&&&

 

He’s half-asleep when they jostle him out of the car.

There’s a noise that he’ll never admit comes from his mouth but Wardo shushes him, helps to hold him up as they make their way inside whatever it is they’re going inside of and Mark’s barely aware of the route he takes to his apartment, when he bothers to go there at all.

He can hear all three of them; Wardo, Chris and Dustin and they’re probably talking about him but he doesn’t mind, just keeps his eyes closed, lets Wardo lead him where he needs to go; trusts him, wants him, needs him.

“Come on, Mark,” Wardo says softly, guiding Mark into his own apartment and it smells fresh and clean; like somebody’s opened the windows in the past few days.

 _Chris_ , Mark thinks and knows that he’s right. Chris is always good, always around, always helping.

Wardo’s asking them something and Mark only knows because he can feel the vibrations against his face where it’s pressed into Wardo’s neck and he can smell something inherently Wardo; cologne and scent and something, something, something that probably means _alive_. Wardo pushes him down on the sofa and Mark goes willingly, resting his head against the cushions and starting to drift off again.

“We’ll call in tomorrow,” Dustin says, patting Mark on the arm and Chris follows him out.

Mark knows he should thank them but he won’t.

Wardo bids them goodbye and then does something in the kitchen, Mark can’t see and doesn’t want to open his eyes, he just wants to lie here, the sounds of Wardo moving around and _here_ but then he’s back and he guides Mark up from the sofa. Mark doesn’t want to let him, he’s comfortable and he can still smell Wardo, can still feel the familiar calluses and curves of Wardo’s hands and he wants to stay here.

Wardo pulls anyway and Mark doesn’t do much else to stop him. “Bed’s comfier, Mark.”

They make it to the bedroom and Wardo’s starting to push him down but Mark doesn’t let go; tugs Wardo in and makes him stay, sleep here, where Mark can feel the heartbeat _thump thump thump_ against his skin.

 

&&&

 

He wakes slowly.

There’s someone breathing against the top of his head, short starts and stops, and there are soft movements like they’re trying to move without waking him and Mark remembers;

 _Wardo_.

He comes awake, pulls back a little so that he can stare at Wardo and

Wardo’s staring back; big brown eyes that Mark’s been trying to forget, to push away, to pull out only when he wants to piss himself off, to hurt himself. “Wardo.”

“Mark,” Wardo says, breath hitching and Mark’s fingers tighten around Wardo’s shirt. “I’m here.”

“I know,” Mark says, mostly amused.

“You didn’t seem to yesterday.”

“Yesterday was yesterday,” Mark shrugs and he knows that look in Wardo’s eyes, panic and a little bit of anger and a lot of worry. It’s annoying that he doesn’t trust that Mark knows his own mind, his own thoughts and his own feelings.

“You’re going to give them whiplash,” Wardo says. “Yesterday you believed I had died.”

Mark flinches and then gets angry at himself for it. It’s minute, barely noticeable but to someone like Wardo, someone who’s been watching him for years, he’s as obvious as holding up a sign. “Logic dictates that you must be here.”

It’s not quite what Wardo said yesterday but the tug at the corner of his mouth means that Wardo remembers, too. “I just-”

“Don’t,” Mark says, not wanting to know what Wardo’s thinking, worrying or afraid of.

Wardo just stares and Mark tells himself not to move, to shift, to give anything away. “You said we needed to talk.”

“I need to show you-”

“We’re not going to the Facebook offices.” Wardo’s voice is hard and angry.

“You’re not still mad at me.”

“That should have been a question, Mark,” Wardo snaps, moving away from Mark and not even Mark’s grip on his shirt is enough to keep him there. He sits on the edge of the bed, running a hand through his hair and not looking at Mark. “Yes, yes I am still angry.”

Mark frowns, pushes the anger down and doesn’t say anything. Maybe he was wrong, maybe, maybe this isn’t his Wardo because when he thinks about seeing Wardo again it goes better than this and Wardo says _okay_ like he forgives him and they don’t fight because Mark doesn’t _want_ them to fight but maybe that’s the downside to your imagination; it’s usually on your side.

Climbing out of bed himself, Mark grabs a clean hoodie and walks out of the bedroom. He has a laptop around here and some red bull and he’ll just code because then he won’t have to think about how difficult this is going to be and he’s halfway to tugging it out from underneath the table when he thinks about Wardo;

Wardo who came even though he’s still angry and Mark hates being wrong, hates not knowing what’s expected of him but he remembers the empty and cold and dark when he didn’t have Wardo at all and moves into the kitchen, fighting the coffee machine for a cup that’s good and feeling something close to satisfaction when he’s done.

By the time Wardo comes out of the bedroom, frustration in the way he’s walking, Mark’s managed to make some passable coffee and he slides it across the counter. Wardo stares at it, then at Mark, then at the discarded laptop. “You made me coffee.”

“I see your observational skills have improved,” Mark says, dryly.

Wardo snorts and then frowns, long fingers sliding around the mug and the frown slides into a smile. “I was expecting it to be cold.”

He indicates the laptop and Mark just shrugs, not about to tell Wardo that he hasn’t even logged on yet.

“You can stay,” he says, before he’s thought about it. “Here, I mean. It’s probably difficult to get a hotel even if you are a billionaire and it’s easier when I have a spare room and you can shower and,”

“Mark,”

“I want you here, Wardo,” Mark says, voice low.

There’s something unreadable on Wardo’s face but that’s not unusual. Mark doesn’t know some of the expressions he uses; has never been able to determine what they mean.

“With me.”

There’s silence and then, “Okay. Okay, Mark.”

It’s reluctant, like he’s not sure, but he’s said okay and Mark smiles, genuine and then fights the coffee machine again. He should have a cup, like Wardo, and it will be maybe normal, something other people do and Mark thinks he owes Wardo to try and do normal things for a while. Maybe he can say sorry that way, instead of having to say it with his mouth, out loud when it would be a lie and he doesn’t want to lie to Wardo, not anymore.

 

&&&

 

“I know you’re angry at me,” Mark says, halting his typing.

Wardo’s next to him on the sofa, TV remote resting on his knee and cradling another cup of coffee against his chest. He just waits, barely glancing at Mark out of the corner of his eye. Although annoyed that he’s not being granted full attention, Mark appreciates that he doesn’t have to say any of this to an expression of accusation or hurt.

“I sent you 36 emails because Dustin said I should. You don’t have to read them. They’re all the same. I’m trying.”

“I want to believe you,” Wardo admits, but Mark can hear the _but_ in there and isn’t surprised when, “but I know you, Mark. I don’t know if I can.”

Mark blinks and nods but Wardo’s shifting, one hand on Mark’s elbow and his mouth so close to Mark’s ear that he pauses, can’t type.

“This is - this isn’t something I’d ever thought I’d see happen to you. Holy shit, Mark. I didn’t know-”

“You died, to me, you died.” Mark says, hating every word coming out of his mouth. “I never wanted _that_. You’re still my best friend.”

Because Wardo wasn’t totally wrong about _you had one friend_ because Chris and Dustin are his friends, all four of them are closer than Mark ever suspects he deserves, but Wardo was, is, _still is_ the best thing in Mark’s life; even over, _he can’t say different_ , even over Facebook.

“Mark,” Wardo says, sadly.

Mark swallows and turns his face away.

 

&&&

 

When he goes back to the office, Mark is more conscious of what he says, does, asks for.

He knows that Chris thinks his assistant is brilliant for putting up with him, overhears it as he passes Chris’ desk, and offers her a raise. She takes it, surprised but smiling and grateful and Mark thinks, _is that okay, Wardo?_

Dustin’s case load has been massive for weeks and Mark’s never questioned it; he looks now and wonders how Dustin manages to get it all done because Mark’s given him a lot, too much maybe and he knows Chris hates it, hates the way Dustin’s eyes are always dark, he’s always tired but he smiles, laughs, pushes through it because he doesn’t want to, because of,

because of _Mark_.

Mark takes some of the coding and pushes it onto other programmers, some he trusts, some he doesn’t but he’s still a bit of an asshole and he likes to, so if, when, if they get it wrong he can berate them and ask Dustin, _ask_ instead of telling, pushing, forcing the work on him.

Dustin notices but he doesn’t say anything because he never does. Eventually he starts to come back in to Mark’s office to hang around, sitting on the corner of Mark’s desk and asking about code, about Facebook, about Wardo and Mark pretends to ignore him.

“Why are you doing this?”

Mark finally meets Chris’ eyes after days, nights, weeks of avoiding them. “Wardo.”

Chris doesn’t need him to elaborate, just gives Mark a smile like he _knows_.

Mark doesn’t care; when he comes home, Wardo is always waiting.

Wardo goes back to New York sometimes but it shouldn't be enough for Mark to notice, to care about the absence but every time Wardo gets on a plane, Mark’s breath hitches, he sits in his office and buries himself in code and he doesn’t go anywhere near the canteen, the staff or anybody else. Chris and Dustin know to leave well enough alone and run interference even when they know Mark knows and hates it.

He just wants to be left alone until his iPhone buzzes across the table and he reads;

 _i’m okay, i’m here. landed,_

and can breathe again.

 

&&&

 

Mark picks him up from the airport on his third trip back home.

He wants to ask Wardo to stop going and he’s selfish enough to do it but the look on Wardo’s face, like he’s tired and just wants to go home makes him stop. When Wardo approaches, pulls Mark in for the hug they’re used to, Mark rests his fingers on the inside of Wardo’s wrist (like he always does) and tugs him down a little.

He pushes up on the balls of his feet, kisses Wardo full on the mouth because he wants, he needs, he needs, _please_.

Expecting a punch, it’s a surprise not that he’s going to admit it, ever, at all, when Wardo kisses back. Mark uses his free hand to hang on to the back of Wardo’s shirt so that he can deepen the kiss and pushes forward when he feels the arm around his waist, keeping them both steady.

Mark’s never dared to hope that this will happen and he knows, like he knows about other things with a steady certainty, that he’s not okay, maybe Wardo and Chris and Dustin are right to worry sometimes because everything's scattered and out of order in his head and sometimes if he looks sideways, it’s like Wardo’s disappeared and there’s ocean and fire and debris where he stood but those are fleeting, sparse and then he’ll look again and Wardo will be fine, touching Mark to let him know it’s okay, he’s here, he’s real.

Other times Mark doesn’t care because he knows he’ll fix it, like he’s fixing everything else and he’ll go back to being a bastard, maybe, but he hopes that Wardo will be there, making excuses and loving him anyway and,

 _loving him anyway_ ,

Mark will care, more than before, and maybe he’ll thank Wardo sometimes.

(Not with words because Mark just doesn’t, can’t but he’ll thank him other ways, ways he thinks Wardo will know what he means.)

Wardo pulls away and smiles, small and tentative but it’s a start and Mark kisses him again, fingers tight on Wardo’s body and he thinks, _okay,_

(document.open(MarkandWardo))

and smiles because he can code, he has Facebook but, important, he has _Wardo_.

 

&&&

 

“I’m still angry,” Wardo says, his actions contradicting what he’s saying; he’s mapping the word _love_ with his fingers, lightly dragging them up Mark’s sides, nails scratching a little and it’s just the right side of intoxicating and _turn-on_.

Mark sucks in a breath, shifts into the touch, hungry. “I, I wanted to make you like me again because the idea that you, when you weren’t around, I just wanted you to forgive me, before,”

he doesn’t finish.

“It’s okay, Mark. I forgive you.”

“Wardo-”

“The fact that you’re saying this to me, Mark,” Wardo says, pressing a kiss to Mark’s temple. “It’s worth more than the big gestures that I know you’re trying to give me.”

“Chris,” Mark says, angry but Wardo’s fingers are dancing light over his skin and he arches his back, hips meeting Wardo’s in _deliciousamazingfriction_ and he moans, low and loud. “Wardo.”

Wardo grins against the curve of Mark’s jaw. “That’s the name I was looking for.”

Mark makes a resolution to say it again and again, over and over until he knows, Wardo knows, everyone knows that Wardo is alive and real and _Mark’s_.

“Yours,” Wardo kisses into his skin, like he knows what Mark’s thinking. “I forgive you, and I’m always yours.”

 _I love you_ , Mark thinks, and writes it in kisses, touches, etching his feelings into Wardo’s skin until neither of them doubt that this is happening, real, _everything_.

**Author's Note:**

> warnings; mark spends most of the fic thinking that eduardo's dead. he isn't. mark just thinks that.


End file.
